She would not have listened to Jenny a minute if she had not heard bits of gossip that connected Wayne with a mysterious blonde woman. She would have branded everything the obviously underworld creature told her as a lie—the beginnings of a blackmail plot. But even before Jenny had told her all, Alice’s intuition, coupled with what she had gleaned from her friends, warned her that the sordid revelations were undoubtedly true.

Her first thought after getting control of her shattered nerves was that she must employ every means possible to save her brother from exposure and disgrace. She had herself to consider, too, now that she was to become the wife of Jack Rathburne. His family meant as much as hers socially. Wayne was a young fool. She suspected that he had had mistresses when he was in Paris. That was well enough as long as he left them there. But to take up with a creature as utterly low and depraved as this Gordon woman was—oh, it was horrible!

She got her father on the phone at once and insisted that he come home right away. She told him that the matter was of the most vital importance to all of them.

Baldwin Senior, tall, silver-haired, distinguished, dropped everything at the office and hurried home. He came into the library with a worried look on his face. Alice sat limply in a chair, a handkerchief pressed against her lips. Her eyes blazed with a cold fury. She was ghastly pale.

“Why, good heavens, Alice, what is the matter?” her father inquired. “You look ill.”

He went over and stood looking down on her.

“Father,” said Alice, “I know you hate anyone to mince words with you. So I won’t. Wayne has placed us in a dangerous position. All of us.”

“Dangerous position?” The elder Baldwin raised his eye-brows. “Oh, come now, Alice, you have a habit of exaggerating things. What could Wayne possibly do to put us in such a position?”

“Wayne has a mistress,” said Alice coldly.

Her father’s eyes widened and then he endeavored to smother a smile that came unbidden to his lips.

“Oh, I know what you’re thinking,” Alice said. “There’s nothing terrible in that. But this woman is the lowest person I have ever heard of. She is not only a former prostitute but only a few months ago she was the mistress of a wealthy negro in Harlem, who is now serving a jail sentence.”

Her father stiffened as though struck full in the face. He moistened his lips.

“Is—is this true? I warn you, Alice, don’t say these things if they are not true.”

“They are true, Father, I swear it!”

“Good God!” He sank into a chair and stared at the row of book shelves.

“I have not told you the depths of her degeneracy! I have spared you that much, Father. We have got to do something, and at once.”